Hunter on Holiday: A Big Trip Around Europe (Jessica and Stephen Parry-Valentine, illus Ashlee Spink, Puffin)

In 2015, Jessica and Stephen Parry-Valentine quit their jobs, booked a one-way flight to New York, and have been sharing their wayfaring through over 80 countries with an audience of 1.24 million YouTube subscribers ever since. Of late, they’ve been joined on their adventures by their young daughter Hunter, and in Hunter on Holiday, she shares her dreams of all the places she hopes to visit in Europe. She concludes that ‘the best part of those places is my family with me’, which, though not necessarily this reviewer’s travel experience, is a lovely sentiment. While the writing doesn’t always sparkle, and anyone attempting to read this aloud will have to meet some of the rhyming couplets halfway, the book is kind and good-natured. Hunter is a real joy on the page, and Ashlee Spink’s art sings and makes it all work. Her bright and obsessively detailed drawings of food, places and cats are utterly lovely, and the book ends with a cute search-and-find page inviting us to pore over it all again. Young readers wanting in-depth information about Europe may be better served elsewhere, but for children aged 4+ who are about to travel for the first time, or for fans of the YouTube channel Flying the Nest, Hunter on Holiday should prove abundantly charming.

Books+Publishing reviewer: Phil Lesnie is a children’s illustrator and a bookseller at Kinokuniya Sydney. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

Category: Friday Unlocked reviews Reviews